Australia is predominantly a vast ochre land, but most
Australians do not live in the outback.

So our landscape should be defined with alternatives and
choices, mediating between the myth of the outback and the reality
of the cities, and that approach underpins the methodology applied
to landscapes designed by Tract Consultants.

Their record speaks for itself. These designers have fervently
sought that middle ground and they have carved out a solid
commercial business in the process.

They attempt to define their designs on a fragment of land - the
threshold where a predominantly European-styled settlement meets
indigenous culture.

By definition, that must be a compromise, but it is also a
creative challenge to delineate a median world where the two
extremes are so diverse.

Tract has published a book to show what they have achieved
during the past 28 years.

It is titled Tract: landscape architects + planners,
and is superbly designed by Gary Emery and printed with all the
glossy bravado that such a project earns.

It is an attempt to properly place landscape architecture in a
cultural milieu.

Composer Peter Sculthorpe has noted that the Australian
landscape is for him a starting point, not an engagement, so his
European breeding is influenced and enriched by his investigations
of the bird songs, didgeridoo and empty sounds of the outback, but
not created from it.

The creation of usable and beautiful outdoor spaces is a talent
that lies profoundly in world histories. To some extent those
places tend to define a culture more than its buildings. Japan's
combed stones, China's terraced hills, Spain's rocky olive groves
and Britain's rolling green pastures are emblematic of their
places, just as Australia's huge brown land is of us.

Yet that level of attachment is just one story, albeit one which
is easy to understand, and likeable, in the way of a simple iconic
tourist brochure.

Australia comprises large, urban city centres which are loosely
connected, but they are separate from the outback, which challenges
designers who deal with the middle ground.

A landscape architect may achieve design complexity in that
place, but must do so within a measured time (and budget).

To achieve such a challenging goal, landscape creators need to
focus on a future vision with more single-mindedness than most
designers.

After all, their creation will not be obvious, nor apparent for
that matter, until long after they have finished. It is a severe
aspiration which needs patience and confidence.

The Tarrawarra Winery in the Yarra Valley.Photo:Supplied

Tract seeks that sensibility, they are ambitious and have
assembled a team of professionals who can tackle confidently a
number of diverse projects.

The practice started in 1976, as a collaboration between two
landscape architects - an American, Stephen Calhoun and an
Australian, Rodney Wulff. Others have been involved over the years,
some in planning, others purely in landscape, but all under the
umbrella of Tract.

They have designed a range of environments which tend to speak
for themselves, but, as for all landscape projects, they evoke
ideas, and creep up on us as the trees and shrubs and paving and
grasses mature.

The palm trees of Beaconsfield Parade, St Kilda, seem natural,
but they were not until Tract designed them. The landscape of the
Mansion Hotel at Werribee Park dwells on the past of that site and
lifts the focus from a private house to that of a public place.

Down the road, the Geelong Highway has been amended to allow
safer and more visually attractive diversions using gabion walls
and eucalyptus trees.

The idea was to save lives using a better freeway landscape,
simultaneously improving the visual and environmental
experience.

Tract have designed the 2006 Commonwealth Game Village
landscape, Cairns Esplanade redevelopment, Tarrawarra Winery in the
Yarra Valley and Brisbane's Government Precinct. Their work has
been recognised by professional bodies and awarded many gongs.

This book compiles the creative and commercial work of 28 years,
over which time we can consider how the landscapes have grown,
their relative value, and the importance of our outdoor spaces.

Although it is always premature to judge landscape design during
its infancy (up to 50 years), it is possible to say that Tract has
trodden the path of creative decency and that their contribution
will be deservedly celebrated even more in 2105.

Norman Day is a practising architect, Adjunct Professor of
Architecture (RMIT) and architect writer for The Age.